No Excuses: Existentialism and the Meaning of Life

What is life? What is my place in it? What choices do these questions obligate me to make? More than a half-century after it burst upon the intellectual scene - with roots that extend to the mid-19th century - Existentialism's quest to answer these most fundamental questions of individual responsibility, morality, and personal freedom, life has continued to exert a profound attraction.

Einstein's Relativity and the Quantum Revolution: Modern Physics for Non-Scientists, 2nd Edition

"It doesn't take an Einstein to understand modern physics," says Professor Wolfson at the outset of these 24 lectures on what may be the most important subjects in the universe: relativity and quantum physics. Both have reputations for complexity. But the basic ideas behind them are, in fact, simple and comprehensible by anyone. These dynamic and illuminating lectures begin with a brief overview of theories of physical reality starting with Aristotle and culminating in Newtonian or "classical" physics. After that, you'll follow along as Professor Wolfson outlines the logic that led to Einstein's profound theory of special relativity and the simple yet far-reaching insight on which it rests. With that insight in mind, you'll move on to consider Einstein's theory of general relativity and its interpretation of gravitation in terms of the curvature of space and time.From there, you'll embark on a dazzling exploration of how inquiry into matter at the atomic and subatomic scales led to quandaries that are resolved-or at least clarified-by quantum mechanics, a vision of physical reality so profound and so at odds with our experience that it nearly defies language.By bringing relativity and quantum mechanics into the same picture, you'll chart the development of fascinating hypotheses about the origin, development, and possible futures of the entire universe, as well as the possibility that physics can produce a "theory of everything" to account for all aspects of the physical world. But the goal throughout these lectures remains the same: to present the key ideas of modern physics in a way that makes them clear to the interested layperson.

The Theory of Evolution: A History of Controversy

Charles Darwin's theory of organic evolution-the idea that life on earth is the product of purely natural causes, not the hand of God-set off shock waves that continue to reverberate through Western society, and especially the United States. What makes evolution such a profoundly provocative concept, so convincing to most scientists, yet so socially and politically divisive? These 12 eye-opening lectures are an examination of the varied elements that so often make this science the object of strong sentiments and heated debate.

The Nature of Matter: Understanding the Physical World

In the 24 engaging lectures of The Nature of Matter, no scientific background is needed to appreciate such miracles of everyday life as a bouncing rubber ball or water's astonishing power to dissolve. Moreover, the study of matter has led directly to such inventions as semiconductor circuits for computers, new fabrics for clothes, and powerful adhesives for medicine and industry.

The Foundations of Western Civilization

What is Western Civilization? According to Professor Noble, it is "much more than human and political geography," encompassing myriad forms of political and institutional structures - from monarchies to participatory republics - and its own traditions of political discourse. It involves choices about who gets to participate in any given society and the ways in which societies have resolved the tension between individual self-interest and the common good.

The Science of Energy: Resources and Power Explained

To better put into perspective the various issues surrounding energy in the 21st century, you need to understand the essential science behind how energy works. And you need a reliable source whose focus is on giving you the facts you need to form your own educated opinions.

The Great Ideas of Philosophy, 2nd Edition

Grasp the important ideas that have served as the backbone of philosophy across the ages with this extraordinary 60-lecture series. This is your opportunity to explore the enormous range of philosophical perspectives and ponder the most important and enduring of human questions-without spending your life poring over dense philosophical texts.

Your Deceptive Mind: A Scientific Guide to Critical Thinking Skills

No skill is more important in today's world than being able to think about, understand, and act on information in an effective and responsible way. What's more, at no point in human history have we had access to so much information, with such relative ease, as we do in the 21st century. But because misinformation out there has increased as well, critical thinking is more important than ever. These 24 rewarding lectures equip you with the knowledge and techniques you need to become a savvier, sharper critical thinker in your professional and personal life.

The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World

Look beyond the abstract dates and figures, kings and queens, and battles and wars that make up so many historical accounts. Over the course of 48 richly detailed lectures, Professor Garland covers the breadth and depth of human history from the perspective of the so-called ordinary people, from its earliest beginnings through the Middle Ages.

1066: The Year That Changed Everything

With this exciting and historically rich six-lecture course, experience for yourself the drama of this dynamic year in medieval history, centered on the landmark Norman Conquest. Taking you from the shores of Scandinavia and France to the battlefields of the English countryside, these lectures will plunge you into a world of fierce Viking warriors, powerful noble families, politically charged marriages, tense succession crises, epic military invasions, and much more.Your journey starts in the 10th and early 11th centuries, when power in England and Normandy was very much up for grabs-and when the small island nation was under continuous assault from Viking forces. Professor Paxton helps you gain a solid grasp of the complex political alliances and shifting relationships between figures such as Emma of Normandy, Cnut, and Edward the Confessor. She also recounts for you the two seminal battles that pitted England against the Scandinavians and the Normans: the Battle of Stamford Bridge and the Battle of Hastings. Throughout the lectures, Dr. Paxton opens your eyes to continued debates and controversies over this year and offers her own take on the Norman Conquest's enduring legacy and the fascinating results of this epic clash. By exploring the year 1066-what led up to it, what happened during that fateful year, and what changed as a result-you'll gain a sharper perspective and a greater understanding of everything that would come afterward.

Understanding the Mysteries of Human Behavior

Every day of your life is spent surrounded by mysteries that involve what appear to be rather ordinary human behaviors. What makes you happy? Where did your personality come from? Why do you have trouble controlling certain behaviors? Why do you behave differently as an adult than you did as an adolescent?Since the start of recorded history, and probably even before, people have been interested in answering questions about why we behave the way we do.

Great Utopian and Dystopian Works of Literature

Can literature change our real world society? At its foundation, utopian and dystopian fiction asks a few seemingly simple questions aimed at doing just that. Who are we as a society? Who do we want to be? Who are we afraid we might become? When these questions are framed in the speculative versions of Heaven and Hell on earth, you won't find easy answers, but you will find tremendously insightful and often entertaining perspectives.

Food: A Cultural Culinary History

Eating is an indispensable human activity. As a result, whether we realize it or not, the drive to obtain food has been a major catalyst across all of history, from prehistoric times to the present. Epicure Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin said it best: "Gastronomy governs the whole life of man."

Being Human: Life Lessons from the Frontiers of Science

Understanding our humanity - the essence of who we are - is one of the deepest mysteries and biggest challenges in modern science. Why do we have bad moods? Why are we capable of having such strange dreams? How can metaphors in our language hold such sway on our actions? As we learn more about the mechanisms of human behavior through evolutionary biology, neuroscience, anthropology, and other related fields, we're discovering just how intriguing the human species is.

The American Civil War

Between 1861 and 1865, the clash of the greatest armies the Western hemisphere had ever seen turned small towns, little-known streams, and obscure meadows in the American countryside into names we will always remember. In those great battles, those streams ran red with blood-and the United States was truly born.

The Dead Sea Scrolls

Whether complete or only fragmentary, the 930 extant Dead Sea Scrolls irrevocably altered how we look at and understand the foundations of faith and religious practice. Now you can get a comprehensive introduction to this unique series of archaeological documents, and to scholars' evolving understanding of their authorship and significance, with these 24 lectures. Learn what the scrolls are, what they contain, and how the insights they offered into religious and ancient history came into focus.

Philosophy of Mind: Brains, Consciousness, and Thinking Machines

The quest to understand the mind has motivated some of history's most profound thinkers. But only in our own time are we beginning to see the true complexity of this quest, as today's philosophers draw on the latest evidence from neuroscience, psychology, artificial intelligence, linguistics, and other fields to probe deeply into the inner workings of the mind.

Max Tegmark leads us on an astonishing journey through past, present and future, and through the physics, astronomy, and mathematics that are the foundation of his work, most particularly his hypothesis that our physical reality is a mathematical structure and his theory of the ultimate multiverse. In a dazzling combination of both popular and groundbreaking science, he not only helps us grasp his often mind-boggling theories, but he also shares with us some of the often surprising triumphs and disappointments that have shaped his life as a scientist.

Publisher's Summary

Choose one: (A) Science gives us objective knowledge of an independently existing reality, or (B) Scientific knowledge is always provisional and tells us nothing that is universal, necessary, or certain about the world.

Made your choice? Welcome to the science wars. This long-running battle over the status of scientific knowledge began in ancient Greece, raged furiously among scientists, social scientists, and humanists during the 1990s, and has reemerged in today's conflict between science and religion over issues like evolution.

This series of 24 lectures explores the history of competing conceptions of scientific knowledge and their implications for science and society, beginning with the onset of the Scientific Revolution in the 1600s up until today. It will provide you with an understanding of how science works that is as important as ever. Though it may seem that the accelerating pace of discoveries, inventions, and unexpected insights into nature over the centuries should secure foundations of scientific inquiry, that is far from true, as every day's headlines demonstrate.

By the end of these lectures, you will understand what science is, and you will be enlightened about a fascinating problem you might not even have known existed. "There have been a raft of popular books about what scientists know," says Professor Goldman, "but to the best of my knowledge, there is not a single one of these popular books that focuses centrally on the question of how scientists know what they know." These lectures are an answer to that critical need.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

What made the experience of listening to Science Wars: What Scientists Know and How They Know It the most enjoyable?

It's literally a page turner. Each lecture leads into the next, touching on aspects of human history that one has learned about but never really analyzed in this context. Professor Goldman brings his arguments to life - well reasoned, crystal clear and intellectually challenging. For the most part objective too

What was the most compelling aspect of this narrative?

The humanization of the historical and contemporary characters

Which character – as performed by Professor Steven L. Goldman – was your favorite?

N/A

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Many... but the overall effect was one of growth. As in all the best courses, you come out the other end having learned more about yourself and your place in the world around you... This course provides it in spades

Any additional comments?

The hypotheses, philosophical arguments and scientific postulations are too numerous to mention. Suffice to say there's something in here for every level of neophyte and expert in the sciences... a real roller coaster ride through it's philosophical history

15 of 15 people found this review helpful

Orange Monkey

CA, USA

26/01/14

Overall

Performance

Story

"A course that could save the world"

Any additional comments?

Steven L. Goldman takes you along on a journey through the seemingly obvious: the success of science to improve the world. Even though that is non-arguable the case, science almost lost it's trust among the general public, with incomprehensible possible consequences due not to the failings of science to generate results, but due to what philosophers of science was arguing about scientific knowledge. <br/><br/>This is a profound question. Is there objective, universal truth? And is that what science gives us? As Derrida and Foucalt came into fashion during the mid 20th century, more and more started questioning the earlier privileged position of scientific knowledge. Social construction theory was slowly undermining the trust in science. This was an important wake up call for the scientific community who had been too busy doing science not to bother engaging themselves in the "philosophical debate". In the 1980s it had become obvious that science was about to lose the war. <br/><br/>Goldman gives an intelligent analysis with key events and individuals explaining the reasons why the science wars came into existence, and how it can be resolved. <br/><br/>Science is not objective truth, but that does not diminish science. Science is still the greatest tool there is for dealing with ordinary experience, giving us control over our environments. Why that is the case, and how that can be argued is brilliantly explained in this course. <br/><br/>Understanding that, is the best way in which most of us can support science, the greatest invention there ever was.

7 of 7 people found this review helpful

C. Telfair

Shepherdstown, WV, United States

17/08/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"Mind Twister!"

What is Truth? Who defines it? Can scientists, as human beings, no matter how brilliant, ever achieve Objective Truth? What's 'Knowledge?' Is there a 'Reality?' Are there 'Facts'? Does it matter? Should it? Why listen to this??

In this course, the questions just keep coming - often, questions most of us never even think to ask. And visiting (or revisiting) those queries, it turns out, makes for time well spent!

My husband and I listened to this on a long summer car trip with lots of traffic jams and road construction delays. His background is in physics, mine is in the humanities - and we both really got a lot out of this set of lectures. They, in fact, went a long way toward making the trip bearable! There's more philosophy and history here than equations and theorems, and thus the course presents a very different angle for viewing the concerns of science and great scientists and philosophers through the ages. And there's much to prove that these questions are just as relevant and important today as ever before.

There are times when it gets pretty esoteric and can make the head spin - I certainly got lost occasionally - but these are issues well worth considering and very pertinent to our time. Professor Goldman assumes intelligence in his listeners and the ability to take in a lot during each lecture. So, the listener has got to work at it - and perhaps it will take more than one time through to get the most from the experience.

Everything is here - history, classic and modern philosophy, politics, science, religion, ethics . . . . If you have any curiosity about how these relate to science and to today's most vital issues, then I, for one, highly recommend you fight out these "Science Wars." It's a wild - and enlightening - ride!

10 of 11 people found this review helpful

Mathspirit

Colorado Springs, CO United States

22/09/13

Overall

Performance

Story

"Fascinating from beginning to end"

Where does Science Wars: What Scientists Know and How They Know It rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

Absolutely top-notch. One of the few that I've listened to all the way through.

What did you like best about this story?

The author's incredible knowledge and manner of delivery.

Which scene was your favorite?

N/A

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Impossible! You need to think and digest each lecture before going to the next.

Any additional comments?

I wish this were available in printed form too. I believe it would be a valuable reference book.

8 of 9 people found this review helpful

Erik Schmitt

27/01/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"Great course!"

Was a little over my level of understanding at points, but genuinely made me interested to better understand the material. Great course!

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Moebetta

Monterery Park, California

16/05/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"Informative"

The presentation of the material, voice of the narrator, and fair coverage of views was both entertaining and informative. Great lecture series, I'll listen to it again and again.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

V. Allen

Il, USA

22/02/16

Overall

Performance

Story

"An absolutely wonderful way to spend 12 hours."

An absolutely wonderful way to spend 12 hours. Dr. Goldman is pleasant to listen to, he is an authority on the philosophy of science and presenting it here in a historical context is great. I only wish I had the course handouts to follow along with.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Anthony

02/08/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"Must Read"

I loved this course. I'm a Christian and I found the history of Natural Philosophy extremely interesting. Professor Goldman is brilliant and presents a wealth of information in an extremely educational and fascinating way.

3 of 4 people found this review helpful

Karl A. Young

15/01/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"Balanced and well delivered course"

This was an excellent and well delivered set of lectures examining the nature of scientific knowledge. The distinction between realist and empiricist views as well as various critiques of the standard realist view are treated fairly and without recourse to straw men arguments. I had a few nits to pick with some of the details, eg. ignoring what I understand to be the extent to which some of Kuhn's arguments were a reaction to what he considered problems with models of scientific process such as falsification. But those were minor issues for me and didn't detract much from I considered an excellent set of lectures.

3 of 4 people found this review helpful

N.F.

19/10/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"Slightly biased against science"

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

I would not recommend these lectures. The critics of science are given a lot of time and very little direct criticism from the professor. The defenders of science are given about one third of the time and every one of them is criticized. Furthermore, important philosophers, like Karl Popper, are barely mentioned if at all.

4 of 6 people found this review helpful

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